Bedroom! Done!

We say this every time for every room, but we’ll say it again, bedroom, you’ve come a long way! We’ve been using and loving this room with our whole hearts for the last several months, but over the past few weeks, we’ve been dialing it in just so. It’s funny, because we thought our bedroom would be the easiest of the three room trio we began last winter, but shouldn’t we have known better? A simple chimney tear down turned into a full blown re-venting of our first floor furnace (new water heaters, too!), but the effort and floor space gained was worth it. We removed a back door in exchange for a wall of windows (a pre-cursor to our now-in-progress backyard plans), painted the room almost black and carved out a little retreat that we consider to be the coziest room in the house.

Let’s go!

We couldn’t be happier with our decision to paint the walls dark, and we’re glad we really went for this bold choice, Benjamin Moore’s Raccoon Fur. It’s a step down from a pure black, and there’s the smallest hint of blue. Our friends have asked, Is it gray? Or Navy? Or…? It’s all those things! We dropped the color 16″ down from the ceiling to hide the fact that the ceiling itself isn’t perfectly straight, and although I feared it could make the room look more squat, instead it keeps the room from feeling too heavy and highlights the bright white trim work we’ve installed.

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Our freshly re-wired vintage sconces flank our rescued 80s-esque headboard, and we took your advice and kept the wall above free of any art prints or decor of any kind. Instead, we each hung a framed photo on our respective bedsides that makes us happy. At first, Scott was at a loss of The Perfect Thing, but when I told him we’ve yet to hang his Parisian cobra-battling-mongoose in our current home (so much art still in storage!), he was all, yup!

On my side, I chose a shot taken of us on the beach in Santa Monica, just an hour after reaching the finish line of last fall’s Route 66 trip. I also included the teeniest framed photo of our Maddie girl wrapped in a blanket burrito. We miss her every day, but seeing her before we fall asleep – well, it helps.

Our closets were – and still are! – a game changer. We worked with IKEA from starttofinish on the perfect PAX wardrobes for our space, and our friend Meg of MegMade helped out by spraying the doors pure white to match our ceiling and trim (Behr’s Ultra Pure White). We topped them off with the hunkiest, most handsome 18″ brass pulls provided by Rejuvenation. They’ve begun to lightly patina with our daily use, which we absolutely love. Side note: The same patina can be said for our DIY kitchen island, which only adds to the charm and beauty of natural brass!

Tucked in the corner under our windows is Grandma’s chair, and we’ve crowned her with the sweetest black and brass sconce from TripleSevenHome. Long time readers might remember when this chair used to be peachy-coral, but we’ve since recovered her in an emerald velvet. She’s so pretty! You know that question about what’s the one thing you’d save from your home in a fire? (Besides the obvious – Scott, Jack, CC and Libby, of course.) For me, it’d be this chair. It was a gift to my grandparents on their wedding day, and after my Pap Pap passed, my grandma gifted it to me. We always say that no inanimate object in our home is too previous, but this one might break that rule.

Across from the bed is our IKEA floating vanity hack, and we’ve leaned a tall mirror against the wall, close enough to our closet for the final dress-check before facing the day. The constellation print above the vanity was found at a thrift store, and due to its odd size, we had it nicely framed by the team at Framebridge. And finally, the snake plant is the same one from the studio shipping room, but it continued to grow (grow, grow!), and so we repotted it in a larger simple black planter and moved it into here. (In its place is Ron!)

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When digging through my hard drive for the proper ‘before’ photos, I had a hard time deciding what could really be considered the starting point! When we first moved into this house, we ripped out a kitchen and plopped down our bed (these floor plans should help make sense of that!). We proceeded by putting no effort whatsoever into the space, instead counting down the days to any future travel where we could count on a clean hotel room; for years, it was simply a hodge podge of clothing racks and dressers to tide us over for the big overhaul. Before demolition began, we cleared out the room, and so I thought, maybe these will work as a ‘before’? The following photos are pre-demolition but post-kitchen. Makes sense, right? Man, looking at these before + afters never, ever gets old.

THE BED WALL, BEFORE|AFTER:

THE WINDOW (FORMERLY DOOR) WALL, BEFORE|AFTER:

THE VANITY WALL, BEFORE|AFTER:

THE CLOSET WALL, BEFORE|AFTER:

The room feels like our own private sanctuary, which, shouldn’t a bedroom always feel that way? This room has been 3 years in the making, but it was worth the wait. All sources are listed below, but please let us know if we’ve forgotten anything!

Soooooooo gorgeous!! I can only imagine how GOOD this one feels to have knocked off the list. You guys deserve a sanctuary, and this looks like the perfect place to escape from it all. Love it!ReplyCancel

The room looks amazing! I love how moody that color is. I have a question on the closet door handles. I’m looking for a handle to put on a barn door to our master bathroom and any drawer pull I find, even over-sized ones like yours, seem shallow. Do you find you have trouble getting your knuckles under the handle to open the closet doors? If not, I love the clean lines of your handles, I’ll probably go with something similar to match our vanity pulls!ReplyCancel

That door sounds neat! To answer your question, we’ve never even thought about it before… so I guess the answer is, no trouble at all! My knuckles don’t even touch the door when I open the closet, but I do have smaller hands. I just measured, and there’s about 1 1/8″ of clearance, which ‘feels’ substantial when we’re using the hardware.ReplyCancel

Wendy Stewart6.28.16 - 10:08 AM

So dreamy!! Love all the little touches and art, of course.ReplyCancel

I bet it would be SO pretty in a bathroom. So rich and dreamy all at once.ReplyCancel

Liz6.28.16 - 10:57 AM

I just cannot get over this stunning transformation! You leave no detail out, and all your choices are stunningly thoughtful. Wish you guys could come make over my bedroom and make it feel as cozy and inviting as yours. Clearly Jack, CC and Libby agree given their happy faces in your photos!

Well done guys!

Quick question- do you feel that a bedroom color like Raccoon Fur could stand up to a room that was not quite as bright as yours? I want to go dark (my husband hates the idea) but we don’t have as many windows or get as much natural light as your bedroom seems to get, so perhaps it would be a non-starter in our space.

Again- congrats! So gorgeous and thank you for sharing the process with us!ReplyCancel

Thanks, Liz! I think the reason we love the color SO much in here is because of all the windows, to be honest. The bedroom is really bright, and it’s off of the bright studio that we painted almost white. It’s tough to say without seeing your space or the amount of light you actually get, but I would 100% recommend getting a sample jar of Raccoon Fur and painting it on a few swatches of poster board – maybe as big as 2′ x 3′ – and placing them around the room. One test pot will be more than enough. Maybe you’ll decide it’s too dark, too blue, not dark enough… This can certainly help to sway you one way or another – both you AND your husband.ReplyCancel

Kiira6.28.16 - 10:59 AM

My favorite of all of your rooms. The framed Chunk photo is amazing.ReplyCancel

So pretty (and you captured it so well)!! This is definitely going to be inspiration for our bedroom – we’ve got the paint already and it’s dark… buuuut, we need to do some plaster repair before we can paint.

I was wondering about the kitty bed… the link isn’t working. Where did you get it?ReplyCancel

Am I allowed to swear on here?? I won’t just incase. This room is so beautiful! Stunning! And you very much deserve such a lovely space after all the hard work you have put into it. I can’t stop looking at it!!ReplyCancel

Really beautiful work, as usual. I have scrolled up and down probably three times! Very nice.

I have a question about your Pax closets. We have a very silly, barely-functional walk-in closet in our bathroom and have considered tearing it out and installing something like Pax along one wall. We’ve wondered if the opening and closing of doors to get to our clothes would make us crazy. What is your experience with them?ReplyCancel

The opening and closing of doors doesn’t bother us one bit, but here’s something to keep in mind (depending on how you configure your closet): I chose drawers that span the entire width of my closet, so in order to access them, I have to open BOTH doors to get into a drawer. Scott chose side by side drawers on his side of the closet, so he only has to open ONE door to access a drawer. You can see more of what I mean here: https://www.yellowbrickhome.com/2016/04/08/organizing-the-bed-bath/

Long story short, we LOVE them. We love the soft close hinges, we love the look and finish and simplicity. We added LED lights that turn on when we open the doors, and by adding personalized hardware, it gives them a more upscale look overall! Good luck with your project – sounds like it’s going to give you a major boost of storage!ReplyCancel

caroline nolazco6.29.16 - 9:08 AM

the link for the cat bed isnt working! i just NEED to know who made it! its so cute!!ReplyCancel

Just absolutely amazing! All that hard work has paid off. You guys have an impeccable eye for design.ReplyCancel

Trilby6.30.16 - 9:50 AM

It seems to ring true for a lot of people that the master bedroom is usually the last (or one of the last) places in a home to finally be “done”. I’m not sure why we cheat ourselves, because it SHOULD be the the first place to get the royal treatment. As you say, it is our sanctuary – from kids, from chores, from life in general. Finishing our bedroom is high on my priority list this summer. Your bedroom inspires me to get it done!!! Congrats on a beautiful space.ReplyCancel

I think it’s because it’s the one room you don’t have to let other people see, though the other rooms may be on display at some point. So basically, it’s that old thing of putting other people, their impressions or societal conventions first. My sister was able to hold out for her dream living room furniture when she and her new husband bought their first home, leaving the front room completely empty for the first year they lived in it, even though every single person who came to visit would comment on it. Most people wouldn’t or couldn’t do that.ReplyCancel

Every details feels thought out, collected, cool and luxurious–without an ounce of it feeling try-hard. How do you do it?! I loved watching this come together piece by piece, but it turned out better than I could have even imagined. I’m inspired.ReplyCancel

Oh my – I love it all. Especially that amazing WALL of windows. Dreamy! We have one teeny tiny window in ours and I HATE it. I want all the windows. :)

And love the dark color on the walls. We used Raccoon Fur to repaint the guest bathroom vanity, and love how the color changes for us too. Sometimes it looks dark charcoal, sometimes its more navy, love it.ReplyCancel

Hi! Just a quick totally random question.. How do you keep the dog hair under control? Perhaps your dogs are totally none shedders and you don’t have a problem but the sight of your dogs in your bedroom freaks me out! Ha! Our little guy is gorgeous and we love him but goodness the fur the fur!!!ReplyCancel

There’s no one secret, honestly! We have a furry house just like any other pet household, but we do try to vacuum regularly (we shoot for every day, but let’s be honest, it’s usually every other day!), and wipe down the window sills, etc. Our pups DO shed, but not a lot. Our kitty is the one that causes the most amount of fur, and after I make the bed in the morning, I lay down her favorite blanket to keep the fur off of where she likes to lounge all day, and then I remove it before I get into bed so as not to get into a sneeze fit. :DReplyCancel

The room looks fantastic! I love every part of it, and the laundry room addition is a dream. Honestly- one of my favorite things is the little penguin door holder! Is that a vintage find or could you share where you found it, I love it! Again- another fantastic job!ReplyCancel